Buried Treasure
by Total Targaryen
Summary: Ashayla is tired of living in the damp, dark tunnels of Mole's Town. By chance she meets Jon Snow - serious and honourable. Curiosity leads Ashayla to wonder at life beyond the Wall and Mole's Town. But can there truly be a chance for a bastard and a whore? More than anything Ashayla craves the light, but the darkness she is trying to escape is forever searching. Jon/OC


**Chapter One: Snow**

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**A/N: Alright, so this is going to be a Jon/OC...so hopefully you like it. Feel free to point out any flaws or if you think Jon is OOC.**

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There was no light, but Ashayla knew that it was dawn. She groaned, the familiar aches and pangs of the previous day's work beginning to make their way through her tired body. She eased herself up, by now accustomed to the darkness. Ashayla had been in Mole's Town for nearly a year now, but although she could wake up and adjust to the dim lighting with ease, she found herself missing the sunlight at times. Whores rarely ventured out from the brothel unless they were looking for trouble.

Carinthia, the brazen Dornish girl with whom Ashayla shared a room, rolled off her own bed and tugged on her sheer red dress, which left little to the imagination. It had been Carinthia who had taught a shy, timid Ashayla the ways of making love, of how to please a man. Carinthia was only three years older than Ashayla's fifteen, yet Ashayla doubted that she could ever rival Carinthia's skill.

"It's dawn already," Ashayla commented rather glumly. Although this was her chosen profession, it had never been one she truly enjoyed. She put her all into it, but at the end of the day, it was work. Just a means to earn money…and in truth, stay hidden. She ran her hands through her dark hair – which had never quite decided between black and brown – and walked across to start smearing kohl on her eyes.

"Wait." Carinthia caught Ashayla's wrist and removed the stick of kohl from her hand. "Isn't it your day off today?"

"So it is," Ashayla breathed, the exhalation bringing her body to a state of relief. The one day of the week where she could put on a respectable woman's clothing and venture into the sunlight, into the exposed part of Mole's Town. However, they would all know what she was. Many of the men would recognise her face from the brothel, and she could never escape the jeers and insinuations that followed her like a shadow.

Carinthia lined her eyes with kohl and her lips with red colouring. Unlike Ashayla, she seemed to truly enjoy her occupation and the attention it brought her. The heavy make-up did suit her better – Carinthia's bronze complexion made her seem exotic in a place such as Mole's Town, but due to Ashayla's fairer skin she felt she must seem like an overdressed, overpriced doll. Ashayla watched her companion – and admittedly in recent months, friend – with slightly envious eyes. She wished she could seem as…well, happy.

"It wouldn't hurt you to smile." Carinthia laughed. "I hope you don't pull that face when you've a man between your legs."

When she had first arrived at the brothel, Ashayla had blushed fiercely at such talk. However, now she would make lazy jibes along with the rest of them. Although she had settled outwardly, inside she was still a jumble of nerves. Ashayla forced an overenthusiastic smile that caused Carinthia to shake her head. The Dornish girl turned and pushed her friend between the back of the shoulder blades.

"Go on, girl. I know how much you look forward to your days off. So enjoy what our fair city has to offer."

Our fair city…that was always what Carinthia would refer to Mole's Town as, with playful sarcasm. Just as Ashayla kept quiet about what had driven her to the brothel, Carinthia also stayed tight-lipped about her own past. Ashayla had never dared ask her, but she suspected that the Dornish girl had experienced hard times in the past, which is why she was so content with the brothel.

Despite having been in Mole's Town for some time, Ashayla always shivered when she set foot into the snow outside the shack that was the brothel entrance. She tugged her furs about her tighter and as always, marvelled at the sight of the colossal Wall looming, seeming to cast a shadow over the town. It sent shivers down her spine, for reasons that she couldn't begin to explain.

Sometimes Ashayla liked to roam to the edges of town and just look at the Wall, admiring it. She wondered what it would be like for the men of the Night's Watch there. Most of them didn't talk much when making love to her. She had often imagined running off to the Wall, or even south to the sweltering heat she had come from. Yet she kept such wild fantasies to herself, for they served no purpose in the mind of a working girl.

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Jon Snow hated Mole Town's with a passion. It wasn't that there was a problem with the town itself, although three-quarters of it wound underground in dank passages. It was the fact that to him, it was a place of corruption. It made him feel sick that many men of the Watch would venture to Mole's Town in order to visit the brothel. They had sworn _vows_, all of them, and yet Commander Mormont seemed to turn a blind eye to it.

Yet somehow, here he was. Not for the whores – he cringed at the very thought. Perhaps the others were celebrating in such a manner, but Jon sat in the pub with Grenn, Pyp and Sam with a mostly-full mug of ale. Jon drank a little, at home with his brother Robb – his heart ached at the memory, but he firmly pushed it away – but here, he was a man of the Night's Watch, not a man who could afford to let alcohol get to his head.

"Look." Grenn pointed out a dark-haired girl up near the bar, sitting by herself with enough furs around her to indicate that she was not one for the cold. There was an empty mug sitting on the table in front of her. Jon didn't like the way Grenn was leering at the girl. "I've seen her before. She's one of them whores from the brothel."

Grenn got to his feet, but Jon caught his arm warningly. "Leave her be."

He just laughed. "I ain't gonna hurt her."

Grenn trudged over to the girl and sat down beside her. Jon's eyes narrowed as he watched the conversation, and how the girl appeared to be increasingly uncomfortable with Grenn's presence. Whore or not, she didn't deserve to be harassed. Grenn put a hand on the girl's arm and she immediately flinched away, recoiling from him. Jon clambered to his feet, which seemed to concern Sam.

"Don't do it, Jon. Please don't make any trouble."

Jon ignored Sam and stalked across the room, hefting Grenn up by the arm and glowering fiercely at him. He hadn't wanted to come to Mole's Town, but now that he was here he wasn't going to watch Grenn making a joke of this girl. For all Jon knew, his mother might have been a whore just like her. Being a bastard had meant Jon's judgment of others was fair.

"I said leave her be."

Grenn looked for a moment as though he was about to object, however instead he sourly pushed Jon out of his path and stalked back over to the others. Jon examined the dark-haired girl. She didn't seem shaken anymore, but her blue eyes were still wide as she watched Grenn walking away.

"He's not that bad really," Jon stated, feeling immediately as though he was trying to excuse his friend's actions. "I don't think he would hurt you."

She smiled wryly. "I've seen men who would hurt me, and that boy isn't one of them."

Jon examined her critically. She was a fairly slender thing, perhaps fifteen or sixteen. However, he found it odd that a whore should have such well-pronounced words, such proper grammar. It was almost as if she had been raised in a noble house and taught to speak properly before she had gone to the brothel. The girl examined him with great curiosity.

"You aren't like the others. You haven't come here to drink and whore your way through town."

"What business is it of yours?" Jon inquired rather snippily, before regretting the harshness of his tone. He was not angry at her, just sullen that he had been dragged out here. "I'm sorry. My name's Jon."

"Ashayla," the girl replied, and Jon was a little astonished that not only did she not ask what his last name was, but she also did not give her own. He was slightly relieved, though. She might be a whore, but he was a bastard, and therefore little better. "You're from a noble house, aren't you?"

"Are you?" Jon retaliated, causing Ashayla to bite her lip and hold her silence. It wasn't a whore's place to be questioning where he was from. It wasn't anyone's place. Where he had come from didn't matter anymore. He was a man of the Night's Watch now, the past forgotten beneath the thick shroud of the coming winter's snow.

"I should be getting back." Ashayla climbed to her feet, and immediately Jon worried about other men like Grenn, but worse, men who might try and harm her.

"Would you like me to walk you back?" Jon blurted, before feeling stupid. He didn't have to protect everyone he met, or feel concerned for their wellbeing. But Jon had grown up knowing how to treat women right. Nonetheless, Ashayla shook her head and laughed in any case, although her eyes indicated surprise at the offer.

"No thank you. I'll be fine."

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Ashayla couldn't stop thinking about the boy from the pub. He hadn't been all that much older than her, and too sweet for a man of the Night's Watch, much too sweet for Mole's Town. She wished it would be him rather than the others who visited her bed – but again, those were stupid and girlish fantasies. Whores made love to whoever paid them, not boys they had only met once.

"Stop your daydreaming, girl." Carinthia shook her head and tossed Ashayla her robe. "You're working today, so put some perfume on and get yourself ready."

Ashayla tugged on her robe in silence, condemning herself to another hard day of having her legs spread. Due to her natural shyness and introverted later, she was not one of the preferred whores at the Mole's Town brothel, however she had customers nonetheless. Carinthia herself barely got a break – she was probably the most popular, and Ashayla often wondered where the Dornish girl had learned her skills.

Ashayla much preferred the heat of King's Landing, but even as a child, she had known that she could not stay there all her life. The brothels there were run by men who knew too many secrets, and so she had fled to the cold north, to a place where no one would ever look for her – Mole's Town. She may not like it here, she may not be content with the life she had now, but she was still alive and that was all that mattered.


End file.
